


Unbroken Cry

by booktick



Category: Dishonored (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Dies/Nobody Lives Except Corvo, Bad Decisions, Bad Ending, Dishonored 2 Spoilers, F/M, Heartbreak, High Chaos (Dishonored), High Chaos Corvo Attano, Lost Love, Mentions of the Outsider and the Void, Sad Ending, love to hate, lovers to strangers, rage and grief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-09-16 01:18:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16944279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/booktick/pseuds/booktick
Summary: "You want me to guide you, to show to a path."There was a brief and damning silence between words."No."





	Unbroken Cry

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I own none of this franchise.
> 
> A/N: I took what was probably meant as a heartfelt quote from The Heart to Corvo and turned it into heartbreak, thus this fic.

* * *

The world is so different now. It is vast and full of people that are merciless and lost. The Abbey preys on the soul of the Empire and there is no end to the bleed of the Void. The brand of the Outsider marks those it should have never, like her dear Corvo. Poor Emily, to have to suffer as she had on that fateful day. Daud lived, and she did not. How difficult was it, she wondered, for the Outsider to take the mother from her child's arms? The answer: _Not at all._

Jessamine was not at peace. There was no peace in the abyss. She tasted the blood still, it choked her one day and now it's all her tongue holds. It is never enough for the Outsider, his curiosity and demand for the world to answer him back grows bottomless. She broke down the pieces of herself in this abyss in hope that no one would tear her from there again. It was a terrible suffering the first time, even as she hates the Void so much. If she could just be nothingness, that would be mercy. She wonders if he'll come again, the Black Eyed Bastard, to tell her stories of the boy from Karnaca. 

And what a man Corvo Attano has grown into. He will come here for a second time. He has scurried through Dunwall once again, cutting down any who came across him. His blade was soaked by scorn. So many taken away by his hand, such a cruel end. Even for Daud, she would not ask this of Corvo. She thinks little of Daud and his Whalers, if at all, and even she does not see such savagery by their hands. The victims of her Corvo, oh how they will be lost forever and have nothing to cling to. Jessamine Kaldwin was murdered by a blade for a similar fate.

The Outsider lets her know when Corvo has fallen into the Void. The first time Corvo comes, she is confused and sad. The second, she is made of fury and fear. He will kill again and dear Emily will not be saved this time. She cannot help her child, her daughter, her darling girl. Emily is just as lost to this world as Jessamine. Corvo was Emily's protector, why has he chosen this path? How many more ships must drown for him? She would have cut herself off from the seams if it meant he would be guileless this time. Alas, she cannot. The Void breathes new life into her before it lets the heart consume her all over again. She must be torn away, pulled back into a world that she no longer fits into.

She yearns for the past, a place before all of this. Her journey ended with marble and red. She does not get to see Emily grow and breathe and live. She is without purpose in their world now. Her love for Corvo once bloomed has withered as minutes bleed into years. Time has no meaning in the Void. But out there? Into the light, the realization of what and how much has passed...it is too much. Why is it that Corvo cannot see the world does not want her anymore? 

The Heart whispers what her mouth can no longer. Her warnings, her advice, go unheeded. Corvo does not wish to hear what he does not like. He wants her to guide him, to be what once. Corvo Attano cannot be loved by what is dead. He grows colder the further away he moves from the truth. He will butcher and he will take what is not his. He is no better than Farley Havelock. 

He forces her to be play witness and accomplice all across Serkonos. Was Dunwall not enough for him? Corvo will have to return there, after all of this. DunwallN where Delilah Briarwood sits on her daughter's throne. At least Delilah has the decency to perform her actions for her own name, Corvo uses her daughter as an excuse to be ruthless. She does not understand him anymore. Had she ever? Corvo Attano will be a plague on her daughter's Empire.

He cradles her in his palms, kisses cold flesh and begs again and again for her voice. He has grown older, grey and grim, and his hands no longer warm her. His lips are no longer wanted or desired. Jessamine Kaldwin is no more, yet he refuses to part with her. He was the person she trusted the most. She does not know this Corvo Attano. This was not an existence she would want, a voice in a heart is no way of living. It weakens her. It is complete agony.

She yearned only for Emily now. Emily...oh Emily. Her daughter will never be flesh again. Emily will have the same fate as her mother, perhaps even worse. Emily will never have the chance to voice her fears, her anger and lost. It was _wrong._ Jessamine could see into the hearts of others by the small bit of unwanted power the Outsider had given her. She was a shattered soul locked away until useful. She could see Corvo's heart like she had the first time, older and still so hardened: _Such sorrow,_ _Corvo Attano._

Jessamine is inconsolable. She is dead, for so long, yet she  _must_ feel everything. And Emily feels  _nothing._ Corvo will suffer as they have suffered. The taste of her name, of Emily's, will be ash upon his tongue until he cannot bare to utter either's existence into the air. She hopes he will live a long life, as lost as them both, alone on his blood throne. An entourage of corpses as reminders of his past, never giving him a moment's rest. He will choke on his own blood, death by his own hand. He must feel what they have felt. He must _know_ , as she has always known. The Outsider must make it so. The Outsider owes her this justice. He _would_ give this, if only this, to her.

Jessamine could not rest, truly rest, until then. She was sure of it. He seeks her out with every breath he holds, waiting for an answer from the Heart. Corvo does not consider she will not help him. He does not know what is to come...but he would. He would.

Corvo wanted an answer, she would give him one.

"You want me to guide you, to show to a path."

There was a brief and damning silence between words.

" _No_."


End file.
